SHAREHOLDERS PROTEST.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 221, 19 September 1938, Page 6

SHAREHOLDERS PROTEST.

SOCIAL SECURITY IMPOST. (By Telegrapn.—Own Correspondent.) CHRISTCHURCH, Friday. Shareholders in the Kaiapoi Woollen Manufacturing Company passed a resolution at the company's annual meeting today protesting against the social security tax to be imposed on the profits of limited liability companies. The motion, which was moved by Mr. T. N. Oibbs, and seconded by Mr. R. Bush, was as follows:—"That this meeting, representing shareholders with an average holding of 330 shares, having a marketable value of £150, desires to enter an emphatic protest against the social security tax as imposed on the' profit* of limited liability companies, and which, in the case of the ordinary shareholders of this company, equals 2/7 in the pound from their dividends. It points out that this tax, in addition to the land and income tax, places a burden on the industry in which this company is engaged, which it is practically impossible to carry and which generally will have serious effects on industrial production within the Dominion." The meeting asked that the protest should be sent to the Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon. M. J. Savage, and the Minister of Finance, the Hon. W. Nash. In an address to the shareholders, the chairman, Mr. A. McKellar, said the directors regretted that the surplus was not as large as it was last year, owing to further increases in costs and some coneiderable recession in trade, which occurred during the latter part of the year. Another factor adversely influencing the balance-sheet was the contraction which occurred in the wool clip of the Dominion last year. After providing £5000 for depreciation, the directors proposed to distribute 5 per cent to preference shareholders and 4 per cent to ordinary shareholders.